Jul 13, 2007

Colonial Virginia Council showcased Bayport Scout Reservation, their new Scout camp in Middlesex County with a grand opening council-wide Camporee on May 18-20, 2007. The Camp replaces the 40 year old Camp Chickahominy, which was sold by the Council to US Homes Corporation in 2004 due to encroaching development around it. With an estimated attendance of 1,700 the Camporee is believed to be the highest attended event in the Council's history. Tim Ewing kindly sent along an image of the patch that was issued for the occasion which was appropriately themed "The Adventure Begins." The patch notably does not include any text reference to Bayport but the design features a tower emblazoned with icons of activities available at the new camp.

While the May Camporee was the first council activity at the new camp, Wahunsenakah Lodge has already held their 2006 Summer Ordeal and 2006 Fall Fellowship at Bayport, pitching in plenty of cheerful service to help get the new camp ready. Reports about both events are available in the online archives of the Lodge's newsletter, Duck Calls.

Larry Johnson kindly sent along pictures of several new patches for inclusion on the web site, including a commemorative shoulder patch issued by the council, as well as several variations of the diamond-shaped camp patch. You can find the camp patches included in the new Bayport section of the Colonial Virginia Council Camps page.

Jul 12, 2007

Before colorful Council Shoulder Patches (CSP's) made their way onto the scene in the early 1970's, Scouts wore Community and State strips on their left shoulder to identify the home of their troop. The strips were made of red twill with white lettering which is why they are also known as RWS patches. These were originally lettered in red on dark khaki decades ago, and can sometimes be found on old uniforms unearthed from the attic or basement.

Recently I was provided images of an old Newport News KRS and a Fort Monroe RWS to add to the Peninsula Council Community Strips page. If you have knowledge of other community strips from troops that were in Peninsula Council, please let me know so that I may add them to the list. If you can provide pictures that's even better!

Way back in May Tim Ewing sent me a picture of the new Wahunsenakah Lodge flap issued for the 2007 SR-7A Conclave that was held April 27-29 at Pipsico Scout Reservation. Larry Johnson sent also me pictures of the Conclave patches, Vigil rededication tokens, and hatpin. For some reason I prepared the pictures and uploaded them to my server but completely forgot to link them from the appropriate pages. So today I added links on the SR-7A page to the 2007 Conclave items, and added the Conclave flap to the Wahunsenakah Lodge 333 page.